Ireland has worst rate in Europe of employing people with disabilities

The European Disability Forum report also highlighted a number of other issues, including discrimination against people with disabilities due to “misconceptions”. File picture

Ireland has the worst rate in Europe for people with disabilities in employment, the Oireachtas has heard.

A damning report from the European Disability Forum (EDF) found that the average rate of employment for people with disabilities in the EU is 51%. However, in Ireland, the rate is just 32.6% , the joint-worst in Europe alongside Greece—however, Ireland has a healthy rate of general employment where Greece does not.

According to Eurostat figures, Ireland also has the EU’s largest disability employment gap, of 38.6, which is the biggest difference in percentage points between the employment rates of persons with and without disabilities. Only 15% of women with disabilities are in full-time employment.

On top of the findings from the most recent EDF study, a separate study in 2020 found that the risk of poverty and social exclusion for people with disabilities in Ireland was higher than anywhere else in western Europe. Some 38.1% of people with disabilities in Ireland were at risk of poverty and social exclusion at the time of the report’s publication in 2020.

Haydn Hammersley, social policy officer at the EDF, told the committee: “We do not yet have a clear insight into why persons with disabilities in Ireland struggle more to enter the labour market than their counterparts in other EU Member states.” 

However, they did point to a number of main issues, including:

• The loss of disability allowance when a person starts working—leading to fear of “in-work poverty”
• Employers being “resistant” to adjustments which would enable people with disabilities to do their job better.
• Discrimination against people with disabilities due to “misconceptions”.

Committee member Dessie Ellis of Sinn Féin said it “beggars belief” that a country "supposed to be rich is at the lower end of the scale” when it came to disability employment and poverty rates. “The unemployment rate in Ireland is shocking when you compare it to other European countries. I don’t know how we are going to plug that gap."

Mr Ellis noted that a lot of jobs that were being offered to people were below minimum wage—which is illegal.

Fianna Fáil senator Erin McGreehan called the employment gap “shocking.” 

“We have a system which quite starkly, to a point, is almost State-sanctioned poverty. You’re damned if you do and damned if you don’t. You go into work and you’re constantly fearful of losing your disability allowance and benefits. If you put up a hand to try and get career progression, it gets snapped off because you lose your benefits. People with disabilities cannot afford to lose their benefits.” 

Independent TD Seán Canney recalled a story from his own constituency where a man with a disability who had gotten married to a woman who was working saw his allowance fall to €60. “He was relying on his wife for support. That is the type of stuff going on and policies are not correct if that is going on."

Fiona Ward, the assistant secretary general at the Department of Social Protection, admitted that the Government “recognised the significant challenges”, but pointed the members of the committee to a number of initiatives which are in place to assist them. She noted that a cross-Government approach is required to address the issues.